Discovering New Things, Or At Least Making My Own Mistakes

I was leary as this garden season progressed.  Everything but the weeds seemed to move so slowly, and the lack of nice orderly rows gave me heebie-jeebies galore.  But the garden is coming on strong, and has become something of a delight to behold.  Production has just truly begun, as the carrots now outpace the peas and cilantro – oh, that crazy productive cilantro!  I’ve scattered seeds along the neighboring lot border to allow it to continue in its claim of the land.

New insects appeared this year by the multitudes.  Squash vine borer was the most obvious, and my vines were not covered.  I identified the entry spots on the main pumpkin vine and applied a plaintain weed poultice at every point after snapping off a few of the leaves and vine branches.  Each hole was covered with plaintain poultice.  That was a month ago and I’ve not seen more than a few yellowed leaves at the primary site.  We’ll see if that was a success.

The plantain grows prolifically in my yard, and I’ve been using it on bites, most recently on a bite that had necrosis (yes, brown recluse spiders are resident here).  The bite healed completely.  My thought was ‘why not’ when I considered its use on the plants.

Below is a sampling of the beauty and diversity I’ve discovered in the garden this season.  I’m making this post my last – as I’ve determined it’s simply time.  Time to use my time elsewhere.

pumpkin squash view

cantaloupe clings to tree limb art

cantaloupe blossom details

false nettle flowers for the butterflies

pumpkin blossom

new rattlesnake beans

what weed is this?

zinnia in the shadows

new zinnia in the cilantro

borage amidst the beans and cilantro

tree limb vine trellis

rocks used for an offering altar, stacked as garden art

coneflower beauty

Thanks for being along for the ride!  This blog will stay live, but no longer active.

No Longer Dreamin’

Summer Time Update

Time sure flies when you’re having fun!

As I hinted in the last post, I’ll add a few pictures of my ‘front’ garden, which is home to the tomatoes and peppers – but more than that, it’s a work in progress.  I want to create a self-sustaining wildlife garden, full of native drought resistant, self-seeding or perennial plants that will feed the butterflies, moths, bees and birds.

The rear garden is a resounding success in terms of good bug population.  The earthworms are outstanding!  I see spiders duck and run every time I turn the water on.  Winged things are numerous, mostly tiny flies and wasps, but also lacewings, ladybugs, dragonflies, blue winged wasps and parasitic wasps.  It’s a good thing, because I’ve seen a good share of the bad bugs too!

Nearly discouraged, I’ve fought to keep my course with the gardens.  They’re not pretty and tidy.  There are no neat rows of voluptuous vegetables.  That’s a tough pill to swallow for an OCD type, let me tell you.  What I have, as you’ve seen, is a structured series of beds, fraught with untidy, self-strewn weeds and such.  Oh My!

The good news is that it’s working.  I’m experimenting with self-seeding, to allow the garden to become less time intensive for me.  What I learned by mistake is that many things we weren’t really aware of will survive a hard winter.  You’ll be as surprised as I was to learn that Pole Beans (particularly heirloom rattlesnake beans) will overwinter and produce heartily.  I now have them springing up nearly everywhere in my garden, right along my overly productive cilantro.  Cantaloupe has also made its own special appearance, along with dill, parsley, watermelon, potatoes, and lettuce.

I’m going to purposely allow several plants to rot on the vine/plant, and just do a minimal rake in and leaf cover at the end of the growing season.  This will allow me to find out how many of these wonderful, fabulous heirlooms will simply grow when they’re ready to grow.

Back to work for me – and for those who are new viewers, mine are gardens of full-on experiments, as I struggle to produce a winning combination of many gardening theories:  permaculture, forest garden, hugelkultur, polyculture, and medicinal native edibles.  Join in, but expect random posts, cuz I’m a busy dreamer.  :)

 

Rough paths and patches of ‘weeds’ for winged visitors.

Permanent wood strip cage for the tomatoes, with space for wire cages inside.

It’s hard to tell, but I dug a deep trench between the tomatoes and the peppers and have filled it with a deep layer of straw.  I fill the trench to provide deep watering, as the Kansas heat will take a toll on these plants if I conventional water them.

Tree limb lined paths and patches of native weeds and self-seeding flowers.

 

And a final picture – the most recent from the rear garden:

 

Back to work!

Dreamin’

 

Garden Thoughts

Gearing up for Spring, and dreaming of gardens and growing and harvest, reality comes crashing in and sets the tone.  That reality washed over me as I posted my recent activity in my garden journal.

I use an Excel spreadsheet to track what I plant and when and how it progresses, with notes to mark target dates, spacing and sunlight needs.  I use a new sheet for each garden year, copying the previous year and revising it to start the new season.

Plot of garden spaces and containers, showing the sunlight by color

Distracted from this progress by a newly discovered idea, I had been engrossed in creating a garden plot on a separate sheet in the workbook and forgot to start my new tab.  Last night, I copied the tab – realizing that I was copying from the previously noted season of… 2011.

Chart of plants and their needs with planting dates and progress notes, color coding left over from 2011

I’ve had a rough couple of years, and I was very aware of that fact.  I just hadn’t realized how drastically it had affected my garden plans until last night.

The past few months have been busy with bursts of organization, purging, and planning.  Activities that had been lacking for the most part during these years evidenced as missed tabs on my garden journal.

I was stirring last year, laying down a plot for a permanent garden, plotting about how to attract beneficial insects, and setting down ideas for permanent plants.  It’s time now.  Time to sink some roots.  Time to take hold of the time I have available and figure out how to do things I need to do.

Time to start gettin’ busy.

Dreamin’